Team Fortress 2 Revealed

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Valve's other shooter not only isn't dead -- it's super-spy sassy.

By David Adams and Chris Roper

Speaking at EA's annual summer press event, Valve's Gabe Newell revealed -- at long last -- Team Fortress 2. Not only did Newell confirm that the title will be included as the multiplayer component of Half-Life 2: Episode 2, but a first glimpse of the class-based shooter showed a surprisingly stylized look reminiscent of campy 60s spy films -- an approach used in titles such as No One Lives Forever and XIII.

Just prior to announcing the game, Newell said that one of the major advantages to working with episodic content and the like is that the team is able to take numerous risks that it normally might not on a multi-year project, like a wildly unique art style. Team Fortress 2 features just this, what with its characters looking like a cross between an action figure and a cartoon character. They're obviously 3D, but their textures are draw flat, giving them something of a mix between a plastic and hand-drawn look.

On top of this, the characters have been designed in a very exaggerated way, be it a ginormous mustache, oversized arms, pencil thin bodies or whatever. In other words, Team Fortress 2 looks nothing like what we've seen before, and fortunately that's an extremely good thing.

The teaser for the multiplayer-centric game focused almost solely on its nine character classes, which include the Spy, Heavy, Scout, Demolitions, Engineer, Medic, Sniper, Soldier and Pyro. Each was basically given a few seconds to mug for the camera before we got a few quick composite photos at the end before the logo splashed again. While it wasn't gameplay footage, what we did see was all done in-engine, though not live.

This was just a first peek -- stay tuned for more on Team Fortress 2 as news comes in.